Union Station’s future forecast

Sunday

Jan 27, 2013 at 6:00 AM

Nick Kotsopoulos Politics and the City

A lot is certainly going on in downtown Worcester in terms of economic development, whether it is the construction of CitySquare, the planned redevelopment of properties in Lincoln Square and along Main Street, or planning for the Theatre District.

For whatever reason, the Washington Square area seems to have missed that train.

But city officials are cautiously optimistic that the momentum that is making its way through downtown will soon find its way there — a place where many people thought it was all going to begin.

“The word is out on our progress in economic development,” City Manager Michael V. O’Brien said in an interview Friday. “National and regional developers continue to look at private investment here to capitalize on our momentum.

“Washington Square has active interest for redevelopment,” he added. “Key public investments like our intermodal hub at Union Station and new roadway alignments, leveraged by private investments at CitySquare, on Shrewsbury Street and the Canal District, have all the right pieces falling into place.”

It has been more than a dozen years since Union Station reopened its doors after undergoing an extensive $32 million renovation and restoration.

The reopening of the historic train station, which was built in 1911 and closed in 1975 after falling into disrepair and being abandoned by its owner, was hailed by many at City Hall as a watershed moment for the city. It was predicted that the rebirth of that landmark would spark a wave of economic development in the downtown, starting at Washington Square.

So excited were city officials about the prospects of what a redone Union Station would bring that they went ahead and eliminated the rather large rotary (280 feet by 360 feet) in Washington Square and replaced it with a much smaller roundabout that is just 192 feet in diameter.

That was intended to create four development parcels in the Washington Square area. There was talk of a new hotel, an office building and a mixed-used building with retail on the first floor on those city-owned parcels.

But none of those dreams materialized.

While there are all sorts of development projects going on in the downtown, such activity has been noticeably absent in Washington Square.

Of the four development parcels that were created, the only one being built on is on Foster Street, west of Union Station, where the Worcester Regional Transit Authority is constructing a multistory building that will house its administrative offices and serve as its central hub for bus transfers and connections.

But that is a publicly financed project and it isn’t the kind of private investment that had been visualized for those development parcels.

There are those who also believe that Union Station itself has even fallen short of expectations. The station was originally envisioned as becoming a beehive of activity, much like Faneuil Hall Marketplace in Boston, with a wide variety of vendors and tenants.

Today, Union Station is home to a couple of restaurants and offices for the Central Massachusetts Regional Planning Commission, a government agency, and an architectural/engineering firm. Not quite the 18-hour-a-day retail/entertainment venue city officials had been talking about when the station reopened in 2000.

Meanwhile, Wormtown Brewing Co. is looking to move its beer manufacturing operations into a roughly 7,500 square feet space on the first floor of Union Station.

Such a manufacturing use was never foreseen for Union Station and it won’t exactly bring a lot of additional foot traffic to the station. But, hey, it will at least occupy some vacant space.

Even the ground-floor retail space of the Union Station parking garage has never been filled since it was opened.

But Mr. O’Brien does not look at this as opportunities lost; instead, he still sees much potential for the Washington Square area and remains confident it will eventually meet the expectations that had been set more than a decade ago.

Without getting into specifics, he said two of the remaining three development parcels in the Washington Square area are subject to “very active” development interest. The remaining parcel, adjacent to Interstate 290, is probably not developable because of its small size, he said.

Mr. O’Brien said the city’s community-endorsed master plan for Washington Square will guide the city’s efforts there, ensuring the city works with developers toward the best uses for the available parcels.

“It sets out a vision of appropriate design and uses to connect the dots of the efforts under way in downtown, on Shrewsbury Street, out to the biotech park and to the UMass campus, and within the Canal District,” the manager said. “The city would be an active participant in this redevelopment because we own three strategic parcels around the square. There are also a host of private parcels.”

Mr. O’Brien said he is also looking at having the Worcester Redevelopment Authority play a bigger role in the redevelopment revitalization of Washington Square. As a city agency, he said, the WRA has development powers granted by state law that can provide an important assist to drive more progress.

“I see the WRA as key to the next steps in Washington Square as these developers’ interests begin to gel to real proposals, and these city parcels become key components to making such deals work,” he said.

The manager said he intends to submit a report to the City Council in the near future, detailing how the WRA will partner with the city’s economic development team and the council to advance both Washington Square and the Theatre District plan.

“It is a unique opportunity to accelerate the next phase of job creation and growth,” Mr. O’Brien said. “We need to bring every possible development tool to bear at this juncture to push our current momentum even further.

“We do not have the luxury of time or any ability to rest — all hands on deck and we just continue to leverage all our assets to bring more life and vitality to Washington Square, Lincoln Square, CitySquare, Federal Square, and border-to-border here in the city,” he added.